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From  a  print  in  ten  colors  by  Suzuki  Harunobu  (1747-1818). 


The  Color-Prints  of  Old  Japan 


By 
WM.  DALLAM  ARMES 


BERKELEY 

THE  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 

1901 


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[Reprinted  from  the  UNIVERSITY  CHRONICLE,  Vol.  IV,  No.  1] 


THE  COLOR-PRINTS  OF  OLD  JAPAN.* 


"What  are  they?"  is  a  question  often  asked  by  those 
looking  for  the  first  time  at  a  collection  of  Japanese  prints. 
To  say  that  they  are  chromoxylographs,  is  to  give  an 
answer  strictly  accurate.  But  as  this  is  more  concise  than 
simple,  it  may  be  well  to  say  in  non- technical,  popular 
language  that  they  are  prints  in  colors  from  engraved  wooden 
blocks,  as  many  blocks  and  impressions  ordinarily  being 
required  as  there  are  colors. 

In  Europe  towards  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century 
similar  prints  were  produced,  but  as  their  reception  by  the 
public  was  not  such  as  to  encourage  their  makers,  there 
was  no  development  of  the  art  comparable  with  that  in  Japan 
in  the  same  century. 

The  Japanese  name  for  these  prints  in  general  is  nishiki- 
ye,  but  separate  names  distinguish  the  three  principal 
kinds:  the  long  narrow  prints  are  termed  hachiraJcaki;  the 
large  "broadsides"  are  ichimai-ye;  and  the  smaller,  more 
nearly  square  prints  are  surimono.  Usually  each  broad- 
side is  an  independent  picture;  but  often  two  or  three,  and 
sometimes  five,  six,  seven,  or  nine  icJiimai-ye  must  be 
united  to  get  the  whole  design. 

*  A  lecture  accompanying  an  exhibition  of  prints  held  at  Stiles  Hall  under 
the  auspices  of  the  Art  Association  of  the  University  of  California,  Feb- 
ruary 7,  1901.  (The  lecture  has  been  expanded  somewhat  and  quotations 
and  foot-notes  freely  inserted  for  the  guidance  of  those  wishing  to  read 
further  on  the  subject.) 


These  prints  were  usually  the  result  of  the  combination 
of  the  talents  of  three  individuals;  the  painter,  the  engraver, 
and  the  printer  generally  being  different  persons.  The 
painter  drew  the  design  in  outline  on  a  sheet  of  thin,  semi- 
transparent  paper,  that  was  pasted  face  downwards  on  a 
slab  of  wood,  usually  cherry,  cut  with  the  grain,  not 
across  it,  as  are  the  blocks  used  by  our  wood-engravers. 
Having  oiled  the  paper  so  that  every  brush- mark  was 
plainly  visible,  the  engraver  carefully  cut  around  the  lines 
of  the  design  with  a  sharp  knife  held  in  the  right  hand 
and  guided  by  the  left,  and  with  small  chisels  removed  the 
superfluous  wood.  After  this  outline-block  had  been 
washed  to  remove  all  paper,  as  manj^  proofs  were  taken 
from  it  as  there  were  to  be  colors  in  the  finished  picture, 
and  on  these  the  artist  indicated  his  color-scheme.  Each 
of  these  proofs  was  pasted  on  a  block  and  a  cut  for  each 
color  made  as  before.  In  precisely  the  same  places  at  the 
bottom  of  each  were  cut  a  right- angle  and  a  short  horizontal 
line  to  guide  the  printer  in  securing  register. 

The  pigment  was  applied  dry  and  was  mixed  and  adjusted 
on  the  block  with  a  broad,  flat  brush  loaded  with  rice-paste. 
A  dampened  sheet  of  a  tough,  fibrous  paper,  made  from 
the  inner  bark  of  the  mulberry  and  admirably  adapted  for 
producing  the  most  delicate  effects,  was  then  placed  on  the 
block,  and  the  ink  transferred  to  it  by  pressure  with  the 
haren,  a  flat  disc  of  twisted  paper  rolled  spirally  and  covered 
with  a  piece  of  the  dried  sheath  of  a  bamboo  sprout. 
Sometimes  the  ink  was  partially  wiped  from  the  block  with 
a  cloth  or  brush  or  the  ball  of  the  thumb,  as  is  done  by  our 
printers  of  etchings,  and  what  is  termed  a  "gradation 
print"  produced. 

Ordinarily,  as  has  been  said,  as  many  blocks  and 
impressions  are  required  as  there  are  colors,  and  in  some 
modern  work,  as  the  Kokkwa,  the  great  art-work  in  which 
Mr.  Ogawa  of  Tokyo  is  reproducing  masterpieces  of  the 
various  schools  of  Japanese  art,  the  finished  picture  is 
said  to  be  the  result  in  some  cases  of  no  less  than  ninety 


printings.*  But  in  the  old  work  new  shades  and  tints  were 
often  produced  by  superimposing  two  or  more  colors,  and 
Dr.  Anderson  states  that  "the  effect  of  printing  from  two  or 
more  blocks  was  obtained  in  some  cases  by  preparing  a 
single  block  with  ink  of  different  colors. "t  Sometimes  a 
deeplj^  incised,  uninked  block  was  used  to  emboss  certain 
parts  of  the  design;  waves,  foliage,  the  patterns  of  cloths, 
and  the  folds  of  Mmonos  being  thus  treated.  This  is  not 
as  common  in  the  ichimai-ye  as  in  the  surimono.  These 
small  prints  were  usually  printed  with  greater  care  on  a 
finer  quality  of  paper,  and  were  frequently  given  added  rich- 
ness by  the  use  of  gold,  silver,  and  bronze  powders, 
powdered  mother-of-pearl,  and  flakes  of  gold  leaf. 

The  method  of  printing  seems  to  us  slow  and  crude,  but 
the  results  leave  little  to  be  desired.  The  impression  is 
much  more  thoroughly  under  the  control  of  the  printer  than 
in  even  the  best  of  our  machine-presses,  and  seldom  is  there 
a  fault  in  the  register.  Much  of  the  success  of  the  finished 
picture  depended  on  the  care  taken  by  the  printer,  and 
prints  from  the  same  blocks  vary  quite  decidedly  in  value. 
The  method  of  applying  the  ink  to  the  block  accounts  for 
the  fact  that  it  is  almost  impossible  to  find  two  prints 
from  the  best  period  that  are  precisely  alike:  sometimes 
there  is  but  a  slight  difference  in  the  colors,  sometimes  the 
whole  color-scheme  is  different. 

Gradation- printing  came  into  use  comparatively  late  and 
is  to  be  found  mainly  in  the  landscapes  of  Hiroshige  and  his 
imitators.  A  cheap,  late  print  representing  a  huge  fire 
burning  in  the  foreground  of  a  snow- clad  landscape,  is  in 
this  respect  noteworthy.  The  column  of  smoke  from  the 
fire  extends  across  three-quarters  of  the  picture,  and  the 
gradual  loss  of  density  of  the  smoke  as  it  rises  is  admirably 
represented :  the  red  of  the  flames  shades  off  into  the  gray 
smoke,  so  dense  that  the  ridge  of  snow  just  back  of  the  fire 
cannot   be   seen   through   it;    the    whiteness  of  the   next 

*  Hill-Burton,  M.  R. :  Photography  and  Color-Printing  in  Japan.  Inter- 
national Studio,  5:250. 

t  Anderson,  Wm. :  Japanese  Wood  Engravings.    London,  1895,  p.  64. 


ridge  can  faintly  be  perceived;  the  next  is  quite  apparent, 
as  is  the  distant  cone  of  Fuji;  the  red  glow  of  the  sunset 
sky  is  also  seen  through  the  dark  gray;  and  near  the  top  of 
the  picture  the  gradually  deepening  blue  of  the  sky  is  visible 
through  the  gradually  lightening  gray  of  the  smoke.  What- 
ever may  be  its  shortcomings  otherwise,  as  a  specimen  of 
gradation-printing,  the  picture  is  a  great  success. 

These  color-prints  first  became  known  to  Europeans 
generally  in  1862.  In  the  Japanese  section  of  the  Inter- 
national Exposition  held  in  London  that  year.  Sir  Rutherford 
Alcock  exhibited  a  small  collection  of  rather  late  examples 
that  attracted  considerable  attention.  Mr.  John  Leighton 
made  it  the  subject  of  a  lecture  at  the  Royal  Institution 
that  he  later  printed  as  a  pamphlet  and  illustrated  with  a 
reproduction  of  a  print  by  Kunisada.  In  the  same  year  a 
number  of  artists  resident  in  Paris — Stevens,  Whistler, 
Diaz,  Fortuny,  Legros,  et  al — became  interested  in  the 
prints  and  began  to  collect  and  study  them.  Naturally 
they  had  considerable  influence  on  their  work.  Whistler  in 
particular  having  in  his  early  works  almost  as  much  in 
common  with  the  masters  of  Ukioye  as  in  his  later  he  has 
with  the  great  Spanish  painter  with  whom  he  is  so 
frequently  associated.  One  of  his  "symphonies"  is  hardly 
more  than  a  transcript  of  "The  Balcony"  of  Kiyonaga,  and 
in  another  he  follows  Toyokuni  so  closely  that  even  the 
little  red  decorative  label  on  which  the  Japanese  artist 
placed  his  signature  is  reproduced.  His  "nocturnes"  are 
Hiroshiges  done  in  pastel  or  oils. 

As  interest  in  the  prints  increased  there  arose  a  desire 
to  know  the  history  of  the  artists  who  had  produced  them. 
The  revolution  of  1868  opened  Japan  to  foreigners,  and 
a  number  of  educated,  appreciative  connoisseurs  were 
attracted  thither.  These  studied  with  more  or  less 
thoroughness  the  art  of  the  country  and  on  their  return  to 
their  homes  published  works  on  the  subject.  Other  con- 
noisseurs without  the  advantage  of  residence  in  Japan,  but 
with  the  aid  of  Japanese  lovers  of  their  country's  art  who 


had  become  domiciled  in  Europe  and  with  access  to  the 
large  collections  that  had  been  formed  by  museums  and  by 
private  collectors,  added  to  the  literature  of  the  subject. 
The  publications  of  Anderson,  Strange,  and  Holmes  in 
England,  Gonse,  Bing,  de  Goncourt,  and  many  others  in 
France,  Gierke,  Brinckmann,  and  von  Seidlitz  in  Germany, 
Madsen  in  Denmark,  and  Jarves,  Morse,  and  Fenollosa  in 
America  have  made  accessible  a  mass  of  information  in 
regard  to  Japanese  painting  in  general  and  the  especial 
school  now  under  consideration  in  particular. 

It  has  been  shown,  as  was  to  be  expected,  that  there  has 
been  a  gradual  evolution  of  the  art  of  printing  in  colors 
from  wood-blocks,  and,  thanks  mainly  to  the  researches  of 
Mr.  Fenollosa,  the  various  steps  in  this  evolution  are  now 
accurately  known.  A  brief  resume  will  contribute  to  the 
appreciation  of  the  prints. 

Japanese  painting,  like  the  other  arts  of  Japan,  its 
poetry,  and  its  science,  is  of  Chinese  origin,*  and  came  to 
the  island  kingdom  by  way  of  Corea  in  the  fifth  century, 
A.D.  At  about  the  same  time  Corean  painters  made  known 
to  the  Japanese  the  Buddhist  art  that  had  arisen  in  north- 
western India,  apparently  under  late  Greek  influence.  This 
had  much  in  common  with  Byzantine  art,  being  stiff, 
formal,  and  hieratic  in  character,  and  glorying  in  the  lavish 
use  of  gold  and  rich,  but  somewhat  sombre,  colors.  The 
Chinese  school,  on  the  other  hand,  produced  mainly  black 
and  white  work  that  in  the  swift,  easy  flow  of  its  lines  gave 
evidence  of  its  calligraphic  origin.  "All  Chinese  and 
Japanese  critics,"  says  Mr.  Theodore  Wores,  "assert  that 
painting  is  but  a  species  of  writing. "t 

By  the  union  of  these  two  and  the  peculiarly  Japanese 
idiosyncracies,  Japanese  painting  was  evolved,  the  various 
schools  depending  on  the  varying  proportions  in  which  the 


*  Cf.  Anderson,  Wm. :  The  Pictorial  Arts  of  Japan.     London,  1886. 
Bing,  S. :    The   Origin  of   Painting   Gathered   from  History.     Artistic 
Japan,  Nos.  13  and  14. 

t  Wores,  Theodore :  An  American  Artist  in  Japan.    Century  Mag.,  16 : 679. 


ingredients  were  combined:  the  Tosa,  for  instance,  has  a 
preponderance  of  the  Buddhist  element;  the  Kano,  of  the 
Chinese;   the  Shijo  and  Ukioye,  of  the  Japanese. 

The  Tosa  and  Kano  schools  were  aristocratic,  courtly — 
the  first  connected  with  the  court  of  the  Mikado  at  Kioto, 
the  second  with  the  court  of  the  Tokugawa  Shoguns  at 
Yeddo,  or  as  it  is  now  called,  Tokyo.  About  1620  Iwasa 
Matahei,  who  had  been  a  student  of  the  Tosa,  and  later  of 
Kano  school,  broke  away  from  their  formalism  and  tradi- 
tions and  painted  in  a  freer,  more  vigorous,  more  realistic 
style.  Moreover,  instead  of  confining  himself  to  subjects 
drawn  from  the  courtly  life,  the  history,  and  the  aristo- 
cratic literature  of  Japan  and  China,  Matahei  painted  the 
subjects  that  he  saw  in  the  every- day  world  about  him. 
His  example  apparently  was  not  immediately  followed,  but 
in  the  next  century  there  arose  a  class  of  bourgeois  artists 
who  looked  back  to  Matahei  as  their  master,  and  to  the 
school  that  was  founded  there  was  given  the  significant 
name  Ukioye — Painting  of  the  Floating  (or  Passing)  World. 
This  was,  it  must  be  remembered,  distinctly  the  people's 
art;  its  artists  were  despised  by  those  of  the  aristo- 
cratic schools,  and  to  this  day,  when  connoisseurs  of  all 
lands  are  singing  the  praises  of  the  Ukioye  school,  the 
upper  classes  of  Japan  hold  it  somewhat  in  contempt.  Mr. 
John  La  Farge,  on  his  visit  to  Japan,  found  that  in  talking 
to  artists  of  the  Kano  school,  it  was  advisable  to  make  no 
reference  to  the  work  of  Hokusai,  whom  all  European 
critics  place  among  the  world's  master  painters.* 

Probably  the  fact  that  Matahei  confined  himself  to  paint- 
ing, in  part  explains  why  his  example  was  not  at  once 
imitated.  To  produce  works  that  did  not  appeal  to  the 
class  that  could  afford  to  buy  and  were  necessarily  too 
expensive  for  those  to  whom  they  did  appeal,  was  to  pro- 
duce "art  for  art's  sake"  in  a  sense  that,  even  in  those 
days  of  uncommercial  art,  could  not  win  many  proselytes. 
Not  till  late  in  the  seventeenth  century  did  Matahei  have  a 

*  La  Farge,  John :  An  Artist's  Letters  from  Japan.    Century  Mag. ,  24 :427. 


disciple.  Then  Hishigawa  Moronobu  followed  his  example 
in  abandoning  the  wornout  classical  themes  and  finding  his 
subjects  in  the  commonplace,  everyday  life  about  him.  To 
popularize  his  work  he  availed  himself  of  the  art  of  the 
wood-engraver,  which  had  been  introduced  into  Japan  via 
Corea  in  the  twelfth  or  thirteenth  century  and  had  there- 
tofore been  used  mainly  for  the  production  of  portraits  of 
Buddhist  saints  whose  woodenness  was  by  no  means  confined 
to  the  block  from  which  they  were  printed.  Moronobu, 
however,  produced  books  of  pictures  that  mark  the  beginning 
of  artistic  wood-engraving  in  Japan.  In  these  the  common 
people,  who  could  not  afford  original  paintings,  could 
indulge  their  taste  for  the  artistic,  and  their  popularity  led 
Moronubu  to  issue  many  volumes.  These,  Dr.  Anderson 
tells  us,  "include  copies  of  famous  pictures,  drawings  of 
landscapes  and  street  scenes,  illustrated  stories,  incidents  of 
history,  poetry,  and  in  fact  almost  everything  with  which 
we  are  familiar  in  the  works  of  later  and  better  known 
men."*  To  add  to  the  effect  these  black  and  white  repro- 
ductions of  sketches  were  sometimes  "spotted"  with  color 
by  hand. 

Moronobu 's  success  soon  called  forth  imitators,  and  one 
of  these,  Okumura  Masanobu,  did  not  confine  himself  to 
the  production  of  books,  but  issued  independent  pictures 
that  could  be  hung  on  the  wall  like  hakemonos  or  pasted  on 
screens.  These  too  were  often  hand- colored,  but  about 
1743  there  appeared  prints  from  three  blocks,  one  for  the 
black  outline,  one  for  a  pale  rose  tint,  and  one  for  a  light 
green.  Just  who  deserves  the  credit  for  this  innovation  is 
not  certainly  known — Mr.  FenoUosa  is  inclined  to  credit  it 
to  Nishimura  Shigenagat — and  is  unimportant,  for  it  was  at 
once  adopted  by  all  the  leading  designers  of  the  time.  It 
seems  strange  to  us  that  the  possibilities  of  this  new  method 
were  not  at  once  grasped,  but  apparently  fully  fifteen  years 
passed  before  a  third  color  was  added,  and  nearly  twenty- 

*  Japanese  Wood  Engravings,  p.  16. 

tFenollosa,  Ernest  F.:  The  Masters  of  Ukioye.     New  York,  1896,  p.  23. 


five  before  Suzuki  Harunobu  by  the  use  of  seven  or  eight 
blocks  produced  prints  that  were  not  merely  "mosaics 
spotted  on  a  white  ground,"  but  were  pictures  with  atmos- 
phere, background,  and  a  more  or  less — generally  less — 
correct  perspective.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  the  Japanese 
usually  term  Harunobu  the  inventor  of  the  nishiki-ye, 
though,  as  we  have  seen,  he  was  merely  the  culmination  of 
a  century-long  development. 

Before  a  brief  account  of  the  principal  schools,  or  "fami- 
lies," of  the  Ukioye  is  given,  it  may  be  well  to  explain  a 
peculiarity  in  regard  to  the  names  by  which  the  artists  are 
known  to  us.  These  are  never  their  family,  but  are  merely 
their  brush-names.  Usually  a  painter's  name  indicates  his 
relation  to  some  preceding  artist  whose  pupil  he  has  been 
or  whose  work  he  strives  to  imitate.  Often  the  first  name 
indicates  the  school  to  which  an  artist  belongs,  while  the 
second,  by  which  he  is  generally  known,  is  formed  by  a 
prefix  or  suffix  to  a  part  of  the  name  of  his  special  teacher. 
Thus  a  boy  named  Kumakichi  was  sent  by  his  father  to 
learn  the  art  of  color-printing  from  Utagawa  Toyoharu  and 
adopted  the  professional  name  of  Utagawa  Toy okuni.  He 
in  turn  had  as  a  pupil  Kunisada,  who  was  the  teacher  of 
Sadahide.  Sometimes  a  master  gave  to  a  favorite  pupil  a 
name  that  he  had  himself  abandoned,  as  Hokusai,  about 
1800,  bestowed  the  name  Shinsai  on  his  pupil  Hanji.* 
Sometimes  after  the  death  of  a  famous  artist  a  successful 
pupil  adopted  his  name,  as  in  1844,  Toyokuni  having  been 
dead  nineteen  years,  Kunisada  issued  a  surimono  announcing 
to  his  friends  that  thereafter  he  was  to  be  known  as  Toyo- 
kuni. Toyokuni' s  son  Naogiro  also  abandoned  the  name 
of  Toyoshige  that  he  had  taken  on  becoming  a  student  with 
his  father,  and  adopted  that  of  Toyokuni.  As  a  more 
modern  artist  also  complimented  the  great  master  of  the 
Utagawa  school  in  a  similar  manner,  this  brush-name 
appears  on  an  immense  number  of  prints  that  vary  quite 
decidedly  in  artistic  worth  and  commercial  value. 

*De  Goncourt,  Edmond:  Hokousai.     Paris,  1896,  p   339. 


Another  element  of  perplexity  to  the  collector  comes 
from  the  fact,  already  indicated,  that  the  painters  some- 
times changed  their  brush-names.  The  artist  usually 
known  as  Hokusai,  a  name  that  does  not  indicate  his  rela- 
tion to  any  preceding  painter,  but  that  means  simply  "the 
northern  studio,"  is  the  most  striking  example  of  this: 
during  his  long  life  as  an  artist  he  used  many  different 
names,  among  them  Katsugawa  Shunro,  Mugura  Shunro, 
Taito,  Tokitaro,  Kako,  Tamekazu,  Manji,  Shinsai,  and 
Man  Rojin.  Naturally  when  one  name  is  used  by  so  many 
painters  and  so  many  names  by  one  painter  there  are  a 
number  of  problems  connected  with  the  history  of  the  art 
about  which  the  best  critics  are  decidedly  at  variance,  and 
one  cannot  be  known  as  a  collector  of  prints  without  being 
frequently  called  on  to  answer  the  question,  "Do  you  think 
there  was  one  Hiroshige,  two  Hiroshiges,  or  three  Hiro- 
shiges?"  To  which  the  only  answer  that  avoids  an  argument 
is,  "I  do." 

The  first  school  of  importance  in  the  history  of  the 
Ukioye  is  the  Torii.  It  was  founded  by  Torii  Kiyonobu, 
who  flourished  from  1710  to  1730,  and  included  in  a  direct 
line  Kiyomasu,  Kij^oharu,  Kiyomitsu,  Kiyotsune,  Kiyomine, 
and  Kiyonaga.  Strongly  influenced  by  it  were  the  great 
artists  Shigenaga,  Harunobu,  Shigemasa,  Yeishi,  and 
Utamaro.*  The  greatest  of  the  Torii,  and  many  think  of 
the  whole  Ukioye  school,  was  Kiyonaga,  whom  Mr.  Fenol- 
losa  terms  "the  central  and  culminating  figure,  with  ripest 
mastery  over  all  the  technical  points  of  the  art  of  color- 
designing  for  prints. "t  According  to  Mr.  Strange,!  he  was 
the  first  of  the  Torii  to  illustrate  subjects  from  domestic 
life,  his  predecessors  having  devoted  themselves  exclusively 
to  theatrical  scenes  and  portraits  of  actors ;  but  the  accuracy 
of  this  statement  may  fairly  be  questioned.  In  beauty  of 
line  and  color,  grace,  delicacy,  and  tender  feeling,  he  is  at 

*Cf.  De  Goncourt,  Edmond:  Outamaro.     Paris,  1891. 
tThe  Masters  of  Ukioye,  p.  115. 
t  Japanese  Illustration,  p.  26. 


least  the  equal  of  Yeishi  and  Utamaro,  who  are  sometimes 
ranked  above  him,  while  his  pictures  are  free  from,  the 
mannerisms  and  exaggerations  that  too  often  lower  the 
artistic  value  of  their  works. 

The  next  school  to  rise  into  prominence  was  the  Katsu- 
gawa.  This  was  founded  by  Shunsui,  who  died  in  1750, 
and  includes  among  others  Shunsho,  some  of  whose  illus- 
trated volumes  are  considered  by  Gonse*  the  most  beautiful 
that  Japan  has  produced,  Shunko,  Shunman,  Shuncho, 
Shunzan,  and  Shunki,  But  the  most  famous  of  the  school 
is  Shunro,  or  Hokusai;  who,  however,  long  before  his  death 
departed  from  the  style  and  traditions  of  the  Katsugawa 
and  founded  a  school  of  his  own.t 

The  last,  and  by  far  the  most  prolific  of  the  three  prin- 
cipal schools,  is  the  Utagawa.  This  was  founded  by 
Utagawa  Toyoharu  late  in  the  eighteenth  century,  and 
includes  Toyokuni,  Toyohiro,  Kunisada,  Kuniyoshi,  Kuni- 
masu,  Kunimaru,  and  a  dozen  of  others  of  the  tribe  of 
Kuni-,  Hiroshige,  Yoshitoshi,  Yoshitora,  Sadahide,  Sada- 
masa,  and  scores  of  less  important  men.  Founded  after 
deterioration  had  set  in,  the  Utagawa  school  contains  no 
artist  that  Mr.  Fenollosa  considers  of  second  rank  even, 
and  but  three — Toyoharu,  Toyokuni,  and  Hiroshige — that 
he  includes  among  those  of  third  rank.t  Naturally,  as  it 
was  the  latest  and  most  prolific  school,  prints  by  the 
Utagawa  are  very  plentiful. 

Two  of  the  artists  that  have  been  named  deserve,  even 
in  a  summary  account  of  the  Ukioye,  a  few  words  of  special 
consideration.     They  are  Hokusai  and  Hiroshige. 

To  one  unfamiliar  with  his  work  the  expressions  used 
by  European  critics  in  writing  of  Hokusai  seem  extrava- 
gant, if  not  ridiculous.  But  the  more  one  knows  of  him 
the  more  one  is  inclined  to  agree  with  the  enthusiasts  who 
rank  him  among  the  world's  greatest  artists.     Strikingly 

*Gonse,  Louis:  Japanese  Art.  Translated  by  M.  P.  Nickerson.  Chicago, 
n.  d.  [1891],  p.  68. 

t  C/.  Holmes,  C.  J. :   Hokusai.    London,  1899. 
t  The  Masters  of  Ukioye,  p.  115. 


original,  wonderfully  versatile,  and  amazingly  productive, 
he  influenced  his  country^  s  art  as  no  European  artist  has 
ever  influenced  his.  In  addition  to  producing  a  large  num- 
ber of  kakemonos,  surimonos,  and  broadsheets  of  great 
excellence,  he  illustrated  over  five  hundred  volumes — 
romances  (some  of  them  written  by  himself),  poems, 
humorous  works,  books  of  travel,  sketch-books,  books  of 
views,  educational  works,  etc.  Gonse  estimates  that  the 
number  of  motives  and  compositions  cut  from  his  designs 
exceeds  thirty  thousand,  and  writes  "There  does  not  exist 
in  the  history  of  art  another  example  of  such  versatility 
and  industry."*  He  "was  in  the  habit,"  Sir  Rutherford 
Alcock  tells  us,  "of  going  about  the  streets  sketch-book  in 
hand,  and  at  all  hours,  transferring  to  its  pages  the  figures, 
effects,  and  incidents  passing  before  his  eyes."t  His  work 
thus  became  "a  complete  picture  of  Japan,  a  veritable 
cyclopedia  expressive  and  picturesque."*  Mr.  James  J. 
Jarves  speaks  thus  of  his  art:  "It  is  supreme  in  its  own 
ways  and  wholly  free  from  inane  types,  wearisome  con- 
ventionalities, and  pettiness  or  shams  of  any  sort;  it  goes 
directly  to  its  point,  scorning  all  subterfuge;  sturdy, 
versatile,  never  repeating  itself,  every  stroke  or  thought  a 
distinct  note  in  art,  realistic  or  idealistic,  as  the  motive 
demands,  exhaustive  of  common  and  aristocratic  life, 
spicing  everything  it  touches  with  racy  individuality,  few, 
if  any,  artists  of  any  country  surpass  Hoffskai  in  the 
faculty  of  making  common  things  and  little  things  tell 
more  pleasurably  to  the  fancy  as  artistic  surprises  and 
fresh  interpretations  of  the  ordinary  phenomena  of  nature 
and  society. "t 

♦Japanese  Art,  p.  267. 

t Alcock,  Sir  Rutherford:  Art  and  Art  Industries  in  Japan.  London, 
1878,  p.  135. 

t  Jarves,  James  Jackson:  A  Glimpse  of  the  Art  of  Japan.  With  Illus- 
trations from  Japanese  Designs.  New  York,  1875.  (The  designs  are 
reproductions  of  sketches  by  Hokusai.  The  book  antedates  by  three  years 
the  account  of  the  artist  in  the  brief  outline  History  of  the  Pictorial  Art  of 
Japan,  contributed  by  Dr.  Anderson  to  the  Transactions  of  the  Asiatic  Society 
of  Japan,  for  1878,  which  in  his  Japanese  Wood  Engravings  he  terms  **the 
first  European  account  of  Hokusai.") 


Throughout  his  long  life  he  was  ever  a  student,  never 
content  with  his  achievements.  This  "noble  discontent" 
is  apparent  in  the  prefaces  of  several  of  his  volumes  of 
sketches.  The  Hundred  Views  of  Fuji  was  introduced  with 
the  words:  "Since  my  sixth  year  I  have  felt  the  impulse  to 
represent  the  form  of  things ;  by  the  age  of  fifty  I  had  pub- 
lished numberless  drawings ;  but  I  am  displeased  with  all  I 
have  produced  before  the  age  of  seventy.  It  is  at  seventy- 
three  that  I  have  begun  to  understand  the  form  and  the 
true  nature  of  birds,  of  fishes,  of  plants,  and  so  forth,  con- 
sequently by  the  time  I  get  to  eighty,  I  shall  have  made 
much  progress;  at  ninety,  I  shall  get  to  the  essence  of 
things ;  at  a  hundred,  I  shall  have  most  certainly  come  to  a 
superior,  undefinable  position;  and  at  the  age  of  one  hun- 
dred and  ten,  every  point,  every  line,  shall  be  alive.  And 
I  leave  it  to  those  who  shall  live  as  long  as  I  have  myself, 
to  see  if  I  have  not  kept  my  word.  Written,  at  the  age  of 
seventy-five,  by  me,  formerly  known  as  Hokusai,  but  now 
known  as  Gakyo  Rojin  (The  Old  Man  gone  Mad  for 
Painting.)"* 

In  the  preface  to  his  Saishiki-Tsu  (Complete  Account  of 
Coloring) ,  published  when  he  was  eighty-eight,  he  indicated 
the  tentative  nature  of  his  instructions  by  stating  "when  I 
am  ninety,  I  shall  change  the  style  of  the  art,  and  when  I 
am  a  hundred,  I  shall  work  a  revolution  in  all  branches  of 
the  arts."t 

His  humor  and  his  passion  for  his  art  appear  in  the 
cover-design  that  he  made  for  an  elementary  book  on 
coloring  that  he  wrote  for  children;  it  represents  him 
painting  with  a  brush  in  his  mouth,  a  brush  in  each  hand, 
and  a  brush  between  the  toes  of  each  foot! 

Hokusai  did  not  attain  the  great  age  that  he  desired,  but 
died  at  ninety  in  1849.     His  last  letter,  written  to  an  old 


*  Quoted  by  John  La  Farge.     Century  Mag.,  24:427. 

t  Translated  for  me  from  the  Ukioye  Hennenshi  ( Chronological  Account 
of  the  Ukioye  School)  of  Tadatake  Sekibar,  by  Mr.  Yoshisaburo  Kuno, 
Japanese  Assistant  in  the  University  of  California. 


friend  is  "so  gay  and  so  sad,  so  triumphant  over  circum- 
stances, so  expressive  of  the  view  of  the  world  which 
explains  his  wood-cuts"  *  that  it  should  be  known  to  every 
admirer  of  his  art.  It  is  thus  given  by  Prof.  Edward  R. 
Morse,  who  received  it  direct  from  a  pupil  of  Hokusai 
whose  father  was  a  friend  of  the  recipient  of  the  letter: 

"King  Ema  [a  sort  of  Japanese  Pluto]  has  grown  very 
old,  and  is  about  to  retire  from  office.  He  has  accordingly 
had  built  for  him  a  nice  little  house  in  the  country,  and 
wants  me  to  paint  a  kakamono.  I  must  start  within  a  few 
days,  and  when  I  go  I  shall  take  my  drawings  with  me,  and 
take  lodgings  at  the  corner  of  Jigoku  dori  Niehome  [Hell 
Street]  and  shall  be  very  glad  to  have  you  visit  me  when 
you  have  occasion  to  go  there.  Hokusai. "t 

On  his  death-bed  he  is  said  to  have  exclaimed,  "If 
heaven  would  give  me  but  another  five  years  ...  I  might 
yet  become  a  great  painter."  He  was  buried  in  the  garden 
of  the  Seikioji  temple  at  Asakusa,  and  on  his  tombstone 
was  cut  the  epithet  he  so  frequently  put  on  his  designs, 
"the  old  man  mad  about  painting."! 

He  came  too  late  in  the  history  of  color-printing  to 
contribute  much  to  its  development,  but  as  an  artist  he 
influenced  to  a  greater  or  less  extent  all  who  came  after  him . 
Of  his  immediate  pupils  the  most  successful  was  Kiosai, 
sometimes  from  his  faithfulness  to  his  master's  style  and 
method  termed  Hokusai  the  Second.  Though  Dr.  Anderson 
terms  him  "as  poor,  as  eccentric,  and  almost  as  gifted  as 
Hokusai  himself, "§  Kiosai's  range  was  comparatively 
narrow;  he  lacks  Hokusai' s  amazing  versatility,  and  only 
in  his  comic  work  challenges  comparison  with  his  master. 

While  M.   Geffroy's   statement,   "All  Japanese  artists 


*La  Farge,  Century  Mag.,  24:427. 

t  Morse,  Edw.  R. :  Notes  on  Hokusai.    American  Art  Review,  1:147. 
J  De  Goncourt,  Hokousai,  p.  264. 

§  Anderson,  Wra. :  A  Japanese  Artist,  Kawanabe  Kiosai.     International 
Studio,  6:29. 


have  been  landscape  painters,"*  may  be  true,  it  is  also  true 
that  in  the  Ukioye  school,  as  in  European  art,  the  inde- 
pendent treatment  of  landscape  came  rather  late  in  the 
development.  Again  as  in  European  art,  landscape  first 
made  its  appearance  as  a  background  for  figure-pieces. 
The  first  to  treat  it  for  its  own  sake  was  Toyoharu,  who  is 
said  to  have  derived  the  idea  from  some  European  wood- 
cuts introduced  through  the  Dutch  Colony  at  Nagasaki.! 
His  crude  endeavors  were  continued  by  his  pupil  Toyohiro 
but  not  until  Toyohiro 's  pupil  Hiroshige  began  his  work  in 
the  third  decade  of  the  last  century  were  landscape-prints 
produced  worthy  of  comparison  with  the  best  figure-pieces 
of  the  eighteenth  century.  "In  Hiroshige' s  new  method 
the  Japanese  beheld  for  the  first  time  landscape  art  as  a 
mosaic  of  characteristic  local  colors.  His  skies  were  solid 
blue,  pink,  purple,  or  lead-color,  with  clouds  or  sunsets  in 
realistic  hues;  his  foliage  solid  greens  of  opposing  values. 
The  reds  of  temples,  the  browns  and  grays  and  azures  of 
wooden  bridges  and  buildings,  even  the  colors  of  peasants' 
clothing,  enter  the  same  scale  with  colors  of  sky  and  earth, 
diversifying  rather  than  dominating  them."t 

He  moreover  adopted,  though  with  imperfect  knowledge, 
European  perspective,  so  that  his  landscapes  please  many 
to  whom  Japanese  prints  in  general  are  caviare.  Though 
he  illustrated  many  other  localities,  his  favorite  subjects 
were  Yeddo  and  its  environs;  the  Tokaido,  the  sea-coast  road 
connecting  Yeddo  and  Kioto;  and  the  Kisokaido,  the  inland 
road  between  the  same  cities.  He  excels  in  representations 
of  moonlight,  snow,  mist,  and  storms.  He  did  not  confine 
himself  to  landscapes,  but  drew  birds,  flowers,  and  fish 
with  marvelous  fidelity ;  illustrated  history  and  legend ;  and 
published  figure-pieces  similar  to  those  of  Kunisada  and 
caricature  broadsides  after  the  style  of  Hokusai.     "Outside 


*Geffroy,  Gustave:  Japanese  Landscape  Painters.  Artistic  Japan,  No. 
32,  p.  409. 

fFenollosa,  Mary  McNeil:  Hiroshige,  the  Artist  of  Mist,  Snow,  and 
Rain.     San  Francisco,  1901,  p.  8. 


his  landscapes,"  however,  "there  was  little  in  his  work  that 
would  earn  him  distinction  in  his  school,  but  in  his  specialty 
he  stands  far  above  his  fellows."*  Von  Seidlitz  calls  him 
"the  last  great  master  of  Japan. "t 

Thoroughly  to  enjoy  Japanese  prints  one  must  so  far  as 
possible  divest  himself  of  many  of  the  tastes  and  ideals 
formed  by  a  study  of  our  own  art.  De  Quincey^s  dictum 
in  regard  to  a  certain  class  of  literary  works,  "Not  to 
sj^mpathize  is  not  to  understand"  must,  if  this  exotic  art  is 
to  be  appreciated,  be  supplemented  by  its  converse.  Not 
to  understand  is  not  to  sympathize.  The  connoisseur  may 
readily  grant  that  in  a  print  the  perspective  is  false,  the 
proportions  of  the  figure  incorrect,  and  the  drawing, 
especially  of  the  hands  and  feet,  ridiculous;  and  yet  he  may 
find  the  picture  full  of  charm.  It  must  be  kept  in  mind 
that  during  the  best  period  of  Japanese  color-printing  a 
picture  never  lost  its  decorative  and  calligraphic  character. 
Realism  was  no  i)art  of  the  artist's  aim;  the  curtain  so 
painted  as  to  deceive  the  beholder  into  an  attempt  to  put  it 
aside  would  have  awakened  only  his  scorn.  Mr.  Theodore 
Wores  tells  us  that  a  native  painter  in  Japan  thus  criticised 
European  art:  "It  seems  to  me  that  your  chief  aim  is  to 
produce  a  real  effect;  in  fact  you  strive  to  make  your 
picture  look  so  real  as  to  deceive  one  into  a  belief  that  he 
is  looking  at  nature.  Now  do  you  think  this  can  be 
accomplished  with  paint?"  On  the  other  hand,  he  further 
tells  us,  "It  is  the  spirit  more  than  the  substance  that  the 
Japanese  artist  strives  to  reproduce. "+  Nature  furnishes 
him  merely  an  alphabet  whose  letters  he  strives  so  to  com- 
bine as  to  produce  poems,  rhythmical  creations  of  harmon- 
ious beauty.  By  giving  only  what  is  absolutely  essential, 
by  the  placing  of  his  masses,  by  gracefully  flowing  lines, 
and  by  a  tender  harmony  of  colors,  the  artist  tries,  not  to 


♦Anderson,  Wm.:  Hiroshige.    Artistic  Japan,  No.  16,  p.  197. 
t  Seidlitz,  W.  v. :  Geschichte  des  japanischen  Farbenholzschnitts.    Dres- 
den, 1897,  p.  198. 

J  Century  Mag.,  16:  683,2. 


imitate  his  subject,  but  to  call  up  in  his  beholder  feelings 
and  sentiments  similar  to  those  aroused  in  himself  by  that 
subject.  "To  understand  his  paintings,  it  is  from  this 
standpoint  they  must  be  regarded;  not  as  soulless  photo- 
graphs of  scenery,  but  as  poetic  presentations  of  the  spirit 
of  the  scenes."*  In  a  word,  long  before  Manet,  Monet, 
and  Degas  the  Japanese  artists  were  impressionists,  and 
their  influence  on  the  latest  phases  of  French  art  has  not  as 
yet  been  adequately  recognized. 

Here  there  was  undoubtedly  a  relation  of  cause  and 
effect,  but  no  such  relation  can  be  traced  between  the 
Japanese  artists  and  the  masters  of  another  school  with 
which  they  have  much  in  common.  One  who  knows  and 
loves  early  Italian  art  cannot  but  be  strongly  reminded  of 
the  frescoes  of  Cimabue  and  Giotto  and  the  panel-pictures  of 
Giovanni  Bellini  and  Vittore  Carpaccio  as  he  gazes  at  the 
best  work  of  the  masters  of  the  Ukioye, — Kiyonaga  and 
Yeishi,  Harunobu  and  Utamaro.  Here  is  found  in  perfec- 
tion that  "  sweet  unloaded  flavoring  of  personal  predilection 
without  the  taint  of  personal  self-display"  that  Sir  W.  M. 
Rossetti,  in  somewhat  "precious"  diction,  tells  us  the 
members  of  the  Preraphaelite  Brotherhood  found  so  alluring 
in  the  work  of  the  painters  that  they  took  as  their 
masters. 

The  decorative  nature  of  Japanese  painting  makes  it 
much  more  akin  to  our  mural  painting  than  to  our  easel 
pictures.  It  has  the  same  simplicity  and  "flatness,"  but  in 
much  greater  degree;  pictures  being  considered  finished 
that  seem  to  us  merely  sketches,  and  chiaro-oscuro  being 
almost  entirely  neglected.  It  has,  moreover,  certain  char- 
acteristics that  are  no  more  true  of  our  mural  painting  than 
of  our  easel  pictures:  the  point  of  view  is  almost  always 
high,  as  in  all  early  ai*t;  the  perspective,  before  Dutch 
influence  made  itself  apparent,  is  ludicrously  false ;  conven- 
tions are  freely  used;   and  a  color-scheme  entirely  different 


*  Lowell,  Percival:  The  Soul  of  the  Far  East;  III,  Art.   Atlantic  Mo.,  60: 


from  that  of  nature  is  frequently  adopted.  Some  of  these 
peculiarities  deserve  more  particular  consideration. 

No  attempt  was  made  to  give  apparent  relief  to  a  figure 
by  light  and  shade,  shadows  being  well-nigh  universally 
omitted.  Peter  Schlemihl  would  have  found  himself  quite 
a  la  mode  in  Japanese-print-land!  A  landscape  by  Hiro- 
shige  and  a  picture  of  a  young  girl  standing  in  the  snow  by 
Yoshitora  are  noted  simply  because  in  them  shadows  are 
represented.  This  absence  of  shadows,  combined  with  the 
frequent  lack  of  background  and  of  all  support  or  base, 
often  makes  the  figures  appear  as  if  cut  out  and  pasted  on 
a  sheet.  This  peculiarity  does  not  affect  us  as  strongly  as 
it  did  the  early  collectors,  for  our  poster-artists,  deriving 
the  idea  directly  from  these  prints,  have  made  us  familiar 
with  pictures  of  this  sort. 

It  follows  as  a  corollary  from  what  has  been  said  that 
the  color  represented  is  usually  "local  color" — usually 
because  the  pictures  of  rain  and  mist  by  Hiroshige  certainly 
do  represent  atmospheric  effect.  As  has  been  suggested, 
the  painter  was  unusually  daring  in  his  use  of  color  and 
was  not  at  all  trammeled  by  the  facts  of  nature;  if  his 
color-scheme  seemed  to  demand  it,  he  did  not  hesitate  to 
make  his  sky  yellow,  his  trees  blue,  and  his  water  red. 
And  the  fact  that  our  attention  is  not  attracted  to  the 
incongruity  is  a  tribute  to  his  knowledge  of  color-harmony. 
The  impression  given  is  sometimes  just  what  one  would 
receive  from  the  scene,  though  hardly  an  object  in  the 
picture  is  represented  in  its  true  color. 

The  conventions  of  the  painters,  it  is  frequently  difficult 
for  us  to  accept.  Nowhere  is  the  idealistic  and  conven- 
tional nature  of  this  art  more  apparent  than  in  the 
representation  of  night  scenes.  Everything  is  usually  seen 
as  distinctly  as  if  in  broad  daylight,  only  the  introduction 
of  lamps  or  lanterns,  if  the  scene  is  an  interior,  of  the  moon 
or  a  dark  gray  or  deep  blue  sky,  if  it  is  an  exterior,  de- 
noting the  difference.  The  famous  subject  "a  black  cat 
in  a  dark  room  at  midnight"    would   have  presented  no 


difficulties  to  the  Japanese  artist:  he  would  simply  have 
represented  the  cat  standing  or  lying  at  the  foot  of  a  lamp, 
and  both  as  distinctly  visible  as  if  the  time  were  high  noon. 
Here  again  Hiroshige  breaks  away  from  the  usual  practice : 
in  a  glorious  print  representing  a  fete  on  a  river,  the  houses 
and  trees  on  the  farther  shore  are  dimly  seen  in  darker  blue 
againt  a  deep  blue  sky;  the  middle  distance,  an  island  in 
the  river,  is  in  gray  with  the  houses  and  merry-makers  more 
apparent;  but  the  party  in  the  foreground  is  represented  as 
if  in  strong  daylight,  even  the  details  of  the  patterns  on 
the  kimonos  being  represented! 

The  treatment  of  the  sea  is  also  highly  conventional. 
Seldom  is  there  an  attempt  to  represent  "the  multitudinous 
seas" :  usually  a  few  lines  in  the  foreground  are  considered 
sufficient  to  suggest  "the  waves  of  the  numberless  waters," 
while  the  background  of  the  sea-scape  is  untouched  paper 
up  to  the  line  that  represents  the  horizon.  Sometimes  a 
tremendous  wave  is  shown  breaking  in  the  foreground, 
while  just  beyond  it  the  sea  appears  to  enjoy  a  halcyon 
calm.  A  further  peculiarity  of  the  water  is  that  usually  it 
neither  reflects  nor  refracts.  In  a  few  prints  by  late  men, 
Kuniyoshi,  for  instance,  reflections  of  the  moon  or  of  the 
piers  of  a  bridge  are  to  be  seen,  but  even  in  these  prints 
other  objects  are  unreflected.  No  swan  on  Hiroshige^ s 
lake  "floats  double,  swan  and  shadow." 

Clouds  also  presented  great  difficulty  to  the  color-print 
designer  until  the  invention  of  gradation  printing.  In  the 
later  prints  of  Hiroshige  the  lightness  and  fleeciness  of 
clouds  are  thus  admirably  represented,  but  in  his  early 
prints,  as  in  those  of  Hokusai,  there  are  simply  sharp-cut 
decorative  labels  of  color  to  indicate  clouds.  Sometimes 
these  occur  in  a  puzzling  manner,  and  apparently  are  intro- 
duced, not  to  represent  clouds  or  anything  else,  but  simply 
to  help  out  the  color-scheme. 

Finally  the  figures  represented  were  ideal  and  conven- 
tional. Hokusai  and  Kiosai  were  much  more  realistic  in 
this  respect  than  the  artists  of  the  eighteenth  century,  but 


they  too  had  their  conventions.  Of  the  women  of  Shunsho, 
Yeishi,  Toyokuni,  Utamaro,  and  Harunobu,  Dr.  Anderson 
says :  "  The  gorgeously  attired  women  .  .  .  are  pure 
conventions,  that  bear  scarcely  any  resemblance  to  the  real 
Japanese  maiden  either  in  features,  form,  or  proportions. 
.  .  .  They  are  not  the  women  of  Japan  or  of  any  other 
country,  but  of  the  artist's  imagination."* 

Having  once  opened  their  doors  to  foreigners,  the  Jap- 
anese were  quick  to  learn  from  the  Western  nations,  and 
events  in  China  during  the  last  few  months  seem  to  indicate 
that  they  have  "bettered  the  instruction,"  and  are  now  able 
to  give  lessons  in  organization,  discipline,  and  self-control 
to  the  nations  of  Christendom  that  have  hitherto  been  their 
instructors.  The  progress  of  the  country  and  the  rapid 
adoption  and  assimilation  of  Occidental  arts,  sciences,  and 
social  ideals  during  the  last  third  of  the  century  just  closed 
has  provoked  the  wonder  and  admiration  of  the  world. 
That  the  old  feudal  and  caste  system  would  be  swept  away 
so  easily,  so  quickly,  and  so  completety  could  not  have 
been  anticipated  from  the  history  of  the  centuries  during 
which  the  country  was  a  hermit  nation.  The  change  was 
necessary  if  Japan  was  to  preserve  its  autonomy,  and  it 
would  be  idle  to  deny  the  manifold  advantages  it  has 
brought  to  the  Japanese.  But  in  the  exchange  of  old  lamps 
for  new  it  was  almost  inevitable  that,  with  a  deal  of  anti- 
quated rubbish,  there  should  pass  out  of  her  possession  one 
of  magic- working  power.  The  old  art  is  gone  as  com- 
pletely as  the  age  of  chivalry.  That  of  to-day  is  a  hybrid. 
Even  in  the  works  of  Hokusai  and  Hiroshige  traces  of 
European  influence  have  been  noted:  contemporaneous 
Japanese  art  is  saturated  with  it.  Full  of  superficial 
prettiness  and  facile  cleverness,  it  has  lost  the  simplicity, 
naive  charm,  and  subtle  harmony  of  color  and  of  line  of 
the  old  Japanese ;  and  it  has  not  gained  the  solid  excellencies 
of  the  European.  NisMM-ye  are  still  produced,  the 
popularity  of   the  broadsides  representing  events   in   the 

♦Japanese  Wood  Engravings,  pp.  28,  30. 


Japanese-Chinese  war  having  brought  about  a  revival  of  an 
industry  that  was  languishing.  But  from  a  collector's 
point  of  view  the  prints  of  Ogata  Gekko,  and  Yoshimune 
Trai  are  valueless — save  as  foils  to  make  apparent  the 
worth  and  beauty  of  the  color-prints  of  old  Japan. 

Fuit  Ilium!  And  over  the  entrance  to  one  of  the 
museums  in  which,  after  the  masterpieces  of  their  art  have 
been  scattered  to  the  ends  of  the  earth,  the  Japanese  are 
tardily  endeavoring  to  collect  what  still  remains  in  the 
country,  might  fitly  be  inscribed  Emerson's  words:  "For 
everything  you  have  missed,  you  have  gained  something 
else;  and  for  everything  you  gain  you  lose  something." 
Japan  now  has  most  of  the  nuisances,  many  of  the  con- 
veniences, and  some  of  the  blessings  of  our  civilization — 
and  Japanese  art  has  paid  the  price.  How  heavy  that 
price,  the  Japanese  themselves  have  begun  to  realize;  as 
was  evidenced  by  the  closing  of  the  Foreign  Art  School 
and  the  opening  of  the  School  of  Native  Art  in  1888. 
Its  influence  is  already  apparent,*  but  a  truly  national  art  is 
impossible  at  the  present  stage  of  Japan's  development. 
That  of  to-day  is  not  "bone  of  its  bone,  flesh  of  its  flesh," 
as  the  Ukioye  formerly  was. 


•Fenollosa,  Ernest  P.:  Art  in  Contemporary  Japan.    Century  Mag.,  24: 
577. 


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MAY    9  1933 
APR      7  1935 


MAR  19  194C 

APR  10  1940 

lApr5  2LU 

JUN3-1955LU 


3\Wat 


52SB 


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'55C5ll^ 


20Jan'56GB 

*      20Jan'59J» 
P^CTf  CD 

UUL 1  ^  2004 


LD  21-50m-l,'33 


V^  I    I  OQ.A  A 


YC  1 1 3944 


7 


